Saturday, September 4, 2010

Windy End to the British Open

Today didn't look suitable for decent flying, and I normally wouldn't have gone up the hill. The forecasts were calling for 10 knots from the NW at almost all levels and that normally doesn't work here - too strong and not the best direction at low altitudes. But it wasn't completely ridiculous, so everyone went up the hill.

A task was called that took reasonable account of the winds - wide cylinders round some of the turn-points, wide valleys in easy glide most of the time - with the window opening at noon. Like several of the days, the start involved a tricky glide into the wind, to wait in an exit cylinder over a rounded hill out front.

Waves of Lenticular Clouds from the LZ at La Mure
I launched 15 minutes after the window opened and (unusually for St Andre) didn't find it easy to get high. In fact, shortly before the start I found myself low, well below ridge height, and struggling to get back up. When I got back up, I was alone, and I hadn't even started the tricky glide. Not good.

I set off low, with some wings ahead of me, in the hope someone would find a thermal. No-one did, I tried some promising lavender fields and they didn't work. I found myself really low around Hyeges before working my way back up above ridge height. All the time the wind was strengthening. I got high again and tried to cross to the start again, but the wind was far too strong by now.

I returned to the ridge, and admired the waves of lenticular clouds. After nearly a two hour flight, I decided the wind was getting too strong for safe flying and headed to La Mure to land. Just as I made that decision, the task was stopped. It feels a little strange to fly for so long and so hard, just to get minimum distance!

The air was a little sinky on the way to La Mure, and I used about 1/4 bar to punch through it. Google Earth gave me 75 Kph on that part of the flight; despite the strong winds, the air was reasonably laminar (the advantage of landing at La Mure) and I had an uneventful landing.

No-one got goal, but the task was scored. Thankfully, there were no deployments or other incidents today.

Some info on the wings? Ozone R10s had an amazing dominance; 15 of the first 20 overall places, with 2 of the rest being other Ozone wings. But the spread was more than that - the 'last' R10 was in 124th place. 40 out of 150 wings were R10s, with another 18 Ozone wings in the field. 

Some info on the pilots? Russ Ogden won fairly comfortably. I don't really know if all the R10s are 'the same', but if that's the case his win is all the more impressive. 

Some info on the conditions? 6 flying days out of 7, but 2 of the 6 days were stopped (not cancelled) which isn't bad at all.

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